Three local drivers are challenging DHL delivery company's reliance on independent contractors with a lawsuit that says they should have received the benefits of being classified as employees for the package delivery company.

Filed in Sacramento Superior Court this week, the lawsuit, which seeks class-action status, is the latest challenge to the spread of independent contractor arrangements throughout the courier industry."

In Sacramento, DHL uses DNM Delivery Solutions to provide delivery services. DNM hires drivers as independent contractors. DNM is also named in the lawsuit.

The Bee goes on to say that "In Sacramento, the independent contractors earn between $170 and $190 a day but must pay for leasing their vans, gas, use of a scanner and other business expenses."

We will see how this one goes. The state of California has a task force studying this problem of companies of "independent contractors. The task force is trying to determine if this system is a ploy to avoid giving employees protections and benefits normally given to employees.

DHL lost almost $6 billion - yes with a "B" last year in their US operations (expansions, etc.). They are not going away. It is a fool's paradise to think otherwise. Get ready they won't lose that much this year.......
And everyone said brown is ugly - yellow?

Had to run to the bank. I got there the same time as the DHL guy......he was nice and held the door for me. One of the bank employees was having a pkg. picked up (personal, not bank business). He handed the pkg. to the DHL guy and asked for a receipt. The DHL guy said, "We don't do that." So, he left without the package.

I told the bank employee to use UPS next time. So, even us civilians can make referrals.

BONN, Germany, March 14 (Reuters) - German mail and logistics group Deutsche Post expects further losses at its express courier unit in the United States and forecast flat group operating profit in 2006, sending its shares down sharply.
Deutsche Post (DPWGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research) said on Tuesday group earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) in 2006 will be at least 3.7 billion euros ($4.4 billion), compared with 3.76 billion in 2005. It repeated it expects EBIT to be at least 5 billion euros by 2009.
DHL Express was expected to make a strong improvement in the United States in 2007, but Post Chief Executive Klaus Zumwinkel told a news conference he did not expect it to post a profit that year.
"Further action is needed for the express business in the USA. We need to eliminate the problems we have identified," Zumwinkel said. Post last month abandoned a target to break even at DHL Express Americas in the fourth quarter of 2006.
Shares in Deutsche Post were 5.7 percent lower at 21.42 euros by 1331 GMT, making them the worst performers in the German blue-chip DAX <.GDAXI> index. They touched a low of 21.01 euros, their lowest since early January.
Deutsche Post is expanding its DHL express and logistics businesses as well as extending its mail activities abroad to reduce dependency on the German postal market, where its monopoly is due to run out at the end of 2007.
The mail division still contributes the majority of earnings.
But DHL Express is struggling with losses in the United States following the purchase of Airborne Express in 2003, as it expands to take on dominant U.S. rivals United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and FedEx Corp. (FDX.N: Quote, Profile, Research) in their home markets.
John Mullen, the Deutsche Post board member responsible for DHL Express in the Americas, Asia Pacific and Emerging Markets, told Reuters he expected the U.S. unit to be profitable by 2009.
Asked if DHL Express in the U.S. would contribute to the group's EBIT target of at least 5 billion euros ($6 billion) by 2009, Mullen said: "I certainly hope so".
"There is no more major restructuring to come," he said. "By this summer we expect to see revenue back in positive growth."

ASIA GROWTH
Operating profit at the DHL Express division worldwide is expected to rise to 445 million euros this year, driven especially by growth in Asia, from 11 million last year when Post took a 434 million euro goodwill impairment charge for the U.S. business.
Deutsche Post's DHL Logistics division is expected to raise operating profit to around 500 million euros this year from 315 million in 2005, boosted by the 3.8 billion pound ($6.6 billion) purchase of UK firm Exel late last year and including integration costs and cost savings.
No large acquisitions were planned in 2006, Zumwinkel said.
But these EBIT rises will be distorted when compared with last year, when Post had a one-time gain from a cut in its obligation to fund future shortfalls in civil service health insurance.
Deutsche Post also said on Tuesday it expects group sales to grow by more than a third to over 60 billion euros in 2006, but the problems at DHL Express in the United States and the cost of integrating Exel into its DHL Logistics unit meant the gain in revenues would not translate into a similar EBIT rise.
"(The forecasts) are tied to somewhat higher risks this time, unlike in previous years," said LRP analyst Per-Ola Hellgren, adding that the 2006 EBIT figure could come in as low as 3.5 billion euros because of integration risks.
Deutsche Post finance chief Edgar Ernst told Reuters he would not give a net profit forecast for the year as the company was focusing on the EBIT target.
Operating profit at Post's key mail business was expected to remain stable at around 2 billion euros in 2006. Sales were also seen stable or slightly higher.
The company also announced a new programme on Tuesday, dubbed "First Choice", to improve quality in order to help it reach its 2009 earnings target.
Post added that it would propose a 2005 dividend of 0.70 euros per share, up from 0.50 euros for 2004.
Deutsche Post shares trade at 11.5 times estimated 2006 earnings, according to Reuters Analytics, compared with around 19.5 at UPS and FedEx and almost 14 at Dutch mail firm TNT NV (TNT.AS: Quote, Profile, Research). (Additional reporting by Matthias Inverardi)
<!-- Article Text Ends --> Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved

No dhl is not going away. the numbers dont tell the real story. you see the dhl couriers you see every day are not picking up all the freight they normally do. 6 months ago anything over a cretain size would be picked up by DANZAS dhl's large freight handeling company. while the numbers are down for dhl/us. danzas is not under the same management. so the numbers are a little misleading. if you look at the numbers for danzas they have increased/ while dhl has decreased. its a numbers game. they want to break the union shops, so they are going to make everything look bad for a few years. when the union contract is up in 2007 then they will get the wages down for couriers and the profits will come back. it says in the post above they expect the us to be profitable in 2009. wether they break the union ships is yet to be seen but they are doing everything they can to lose customers.
the daytime dhl drivers are no longer picking up freight from customers. they are trying to leave all of the pickups to the pm route drivers. now with this said the problem is that the pickup windows are not being followed. by this i mean if a customer wants a pickup between the hours of 13:00 to 15:00 the night time supervisors will not call the customer to tell them the driver will be late getting there. we just go there and have to get yelled at. its really frustrating. the station in cincinnati went from the 9th best union station in numbers to almost dead last, in a matter of 12 months. now you cant tell me that is all the drivers fault...we have lost 2 station managers and 7 supervisors in the last 18 months. i have lots of other stories but no time now. but one thin is for sure things will get worse before they get better..

No dhl is not going away. the numbers dont tell the real story. you see the dhl couriers you see every day are not picking up all the freight they normally do. 6 months ago anything over a cretain size would be picked up by DANZAS dhl's large freight handeling company. while the numbers are down for dhl/us. danzas is not under the same management. so the numbers are a little misleading. if you look at the numbers for danzas they have increased/ while dhl has decreased. its a numbers game. they want to break the union shops, so they are going to make everything look bad for a few years. when the union contract is up in 2007 then they will get the wages down for couriers and the profits will come back. it says in the post above they expect the us to be profitable in 2009. wether they break the union ships is yet to be seen but they are doing everything they can to lose customers.
the daytime dhl drivers are no longer picking up freight from customers. they are trying to leave all of the pickups to the pm route drivers. now with this said the problem is that the pickup windows are not being followed. by this i mean if a customer wants a pickup between the hours of 13:00 to 15:00 the night time supervisors will not call the customer to tell them the driver will be late getting there. we just go there and have to get yelled at. its really frustrating. the station in cincinnati went from the 9th best union station in numbers to almost dead last, in a matter of 12 months. now you cant tell me that is all the drivers fault...we have lost 2 station managers and 7 supervisors in the last 18 months. i have lots of other stories but no time now. but one thin is for sure things will get worse before they get better..

Click to expand...

Thats not whats going on at my union barn.The am drivers are getting more and more pick ups everyday and they are slowly cutting the night routes and making 9am start routes that cover deliveries and pick ups .the priority shipments are way down so they can get away with the 9 am start time .

Keep telling yourself that DHL will make money. $900 MIL lose this year in the US. Of course, you can't see that because DP hides the US revenue in their global numbers. DP will only put up with this for another 2 years, then DHL USA will be a niche player, like Airborne used to be. You can not keep up with the UPS and FedEx machine here in the US.

Keep telling yourself that DHL will make money. $900 MIL lose this year in the US. Of course, you can't see that because DP hides the US revenue in their global numbers. DP will only put up with this for another 2 years, then DHL USA will be a niche player, like Airborne used to be. You can not keep up with the UPS and FedEx machine here in the US.

Click to expand...

why would i tell myself dhl is going to make money in the u.s. when i already know they wont.did you happen to notice my name by any chance.i think dhl is a freakin joke of a company .i should know i work there .dhl has lost market share in the u,s. since the merger so dhl would have to improve to be what airborne was .airbornes niche was express shipments and those have all but vanished now .so dhl will go belly up in two years in the states .i hope.

Keep in mind that while FedEx and UPS have the largest presence here, DHL is the richest company of the three. They'll keep on spending until they succeed. FedEx Ground struggled for a couple years and now they have passed everyones expectations. They've grown to the point where there's a rush to build new facilities to accomodate. There's no reason DHL can't do the same. Everyone here talks about leveling the playing field. Looks like that will only happen if UPS employees make some sacrifices. No one will sympathize with an overpaid UPSer begging for more money.

First of all upsers arent over paid for what they do.second of all there will be plenty of sympathy in this country for ups drivers because of the many recent white collar scandals and dislike for big time greedy corperate crooks .

I'm doing a lot of recruiting and a lot of Upsers are eagerly awaiting to come on board. Sure DHL has a learning curve in the US market and has some service problems that will be corrected, but that will change and we will increase our US market share. Like it was said earlier, DP has deep pockets, they will make it happen, due to the fact that the US is the major gate way for China to the European markets and reverse.

I am currently recruiting for an assistant hub manager and full-time hub supervisors

Better clean up your resume...changes appear to be coming soon to DHL. Bear Stearns and Morgan Stanley are putting pressure on the company to close shop in the US due to losing nearly $1 BILLION in the US in 2006. Once DHL customers see this, they will likley divert some volume to UPS and Fedex...just in case. This will only continue the blood loss at DHL...

"So what conclusion could this lead to? A suspicion could be that the radical change alluded to by the financial analysts is that Deutsche Post is going to downsize the domestic system in a significant way and in the not-too-distant future. One could suspect from the Morgan Stanley piece that in order to make their financial goals for 2008, Deutsche Post can’t wait very long to fix the loss situation in the US. This could mean a dramatic reduction in the number of flights they operate. It could mean they close terminals. It could mean they lay off a large number of employees. None of this spells improved service for shippers, or DHL lowering the price they offer in exchange for the reduction in service. The unthinkable that I believe the analysts are alluding to is that they (DHL Express USA) file for voluntary reorganization (most people call this bankruptcy). That does not mean that they go away, they just reorganize in a much smaller version of DHL and perhaps go back looking like the DHL of 2003. (Urban legend has it DHL was only losing $200 million a year pre-Airborne)"

What is going on with DHL Massachusetts, we hear the big wigs may be closing down some of the little hubs. Then we hear they have no new contract and if they do not get a new contract they may go under any thoughts on this?

German mail and logistics group Deutsche Post (DPWGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research) took a hit of about 600 million euros ($877 million) at its loss-making DHL express delivery business in the United States as economic weakness stalled its recovery.

FRANKFURT, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Deutsche Post (DPWGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research) wants to sell its loss-making U.S. DHL business to rival Fedex (FDX.N: Quote, Profile, Research) and talks are underway, the Financial Times Deutschland reported, quoting sources familiar with the matter.
Deutsche Post Chief Executive Klaus Zumwinkel "wants to leave the company in a clean condition" and is under pressure as he retires from his post in November, a manager at the German mail and logistics group was quoted as saying in a report to appear on Friday.
The firm wants to sell DHL at the latest by May, the newspaper added.
A Deutsche Post spokesman described the report as speculation. "We cannot comment on this," he added.
FedEx spokesman Howard Clabo said: "We do not comment on rumours or speculation".
Meanwhile, Deutsche Post Chief Financial Officer John Allan told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper that his company wanted to decrease its DHL business in the United States but did not want to sell it fully.
"Selling the domestic American business is very, very unlikely," he was quoted as saying in a newspaper report also to appear on Friday.
The United States plays an important, strategic role in the international express delivery market for DHL and Deutsche Post does not want to abandon its important hub in that market, he said.
But losses that the company has recorded in the United States until now are not acceptable any more, Allan said.
Deutsche Post on Wednesday reported that it took a hit of about 600 million euros ($879.1 million) last year at its DHL unit as economic weakness and competition stalled its recovery.
ING analysts wrote in a Thursday note that DHL "is likely to decide to keep but streamline its U.S. International Express business, but look for a strategic partner for its U.S. Domestic Express business. A partner could well be an asset-light freight forwarding company with a good track record of solid delivery, such as Expeditors."
Expeditors International of Washington Inc (EXPD.O: Quote, Profile, Research) is a freight forwarder based in Seattle, Washington.
The restructuring at Deutsche Post could also see its Postbank (DPBGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research) unit -- in which Deutsche Post owns a 50 percent stake plus one share -- being merged with another bank, the Financial Times Deutschland reported, adding that a merger may happen in the second half of the year.
Zumwinkel said earlier this month that Postbank ought to remain in German hands if Deutsche Post decides to sell its stake. He said Deutsche Post was considering the future of the bank in 2008.
(Reporting by Rajiv Sekhri; editing by Elaine Hardcastle)

Wow, that's the first news I've heard about them wanting to sell to us. It could happen, because DHL probably has air routes we want and a strong presence in foreign countries we would also be interested in. FedEx bought Flying Tigers back in 1989 mainly to get Asian cargo routes and landing slots, so it's been done before.

The fact that DHL is union is problematic. If you look at all the companies FedEx has bought-up, they're basically all non-union. Fred Smith doesn't like unions, and unless DHL de-certified or fired all of it's union people, I don't think FedEx would bite.